A Certain Ratio, who took their name from a lyric off Brian Eno's flawless pop album Taking Tiger Mountain, began their career alongside fellow Mancunians Joy Division back in the late '70s, crafting a sound that evolved through the bleak references of punk
In addition to the first disc which collects many of their best songs (although hardcore ACR fans might take issue with some of the selections), what's extra nice about this reissue are the b-sides and rarities that comprise the second disc. Those of us who missed out the first time around and are perhaps only familiar with the ACR tracks on the wonderful In the Beginning There Was Rhythm compilation will be surprised to hear that the driving dance-iness of those tracks were balanced out by the decidedly more gloomy sound typical of Joy Division's dark and angular choppiness. Far more punk than dance. Another fine case of a band's demos and rarities being a valuable good listen, instead of being collected for collectors' sake. Highly recommended!
The heavily lauded, AQ fave, psychedelic hippie Japanese collective led by Makoto Kawabata now graces us with two excellent side-long pieces on this LP-only release. The first is a well-executed version of Terry Riley's famous conceptual composition "In
That said, we have a bone to pick with the packaging of this album. If you're going to fetishize a band (and let's face it Acid Mothers Temple is the fetish band of the moment), then for heavens sake do the packaging right! It's not bad looking, just shoddily constructed. Eclipse pressed the album on impressively weighty vinyl, and it boasts commendably pretty artwork, but unfortunately the gatefold cover is printed on glossy yet flimsy cardstock that doesn't fold right, will not lay flat, and is already coming apart at the seams. Furthermore, there's only one LP but two empty compartments in the sleeve, making for an inevitable small disappointment when said empty sleeve doesn't even have an insert or anything. Sigh. Of course, it would have cost more to do the packaging better, but for the $17 we have to charge for this you think Eclipse could have afforded it! Oh well, maybe they didn't know that it was going to turn out so poorly. And packaging aside, this *is* a great AMT album.
Mute U.K. Has finally seen fit to reissue this: hallelujah! This is his first soundtrack (of 4, 3 of which are for films that don't exist). Brilliant album from one of my favorite musicians in the whole world. The cd version adds 3 songs unavailable elsewhere, including the truly essential theme from the Sinatra-as-junkie film The Man With The Golden Arm. "In a black & white world, murder adds a touch of colour." Get this album first!
Wow, what a refreshing surprise of an album, sez Miss Windy. Aereogramme, a four-piece band started by Craig B of Ganger, play a super appealing combination of (get this) the theatricality and LOUD-soft dynamics of Mogwai, and the intensely emotional delicacy
Aereogramme has released two 7"s and an EP, and this is their full length debut, on Matador via the respected Scottish label Chemikal Underground (Arab Strap, Mogwai, Delgados). Highly recommended if you like Mogwai or Sparklehorse, Badly Drawn Boy, Delgados, Red House Painters, etc.
What we have here is a fantastic -- and to our ears widely appealing -- record which hopefully won't disappear underneath most folks' radar like their first one did. Aereogramme are a four-piece from Scotland, and even though this comparison might sound a wee bit too convenient, it is nonetheless true that they sound like the perfect distillation of fellow Scots Mogwai and the Delgados! They have the fragile delicacy and pure indie-rockness of Delgados (and Death Cab for Cutie, especially in the vocals), but you know how just when the sweetness is so sad and heartbreaking, you want something to scream, that's gonna mirror the despair and howl the pain? That's when Aereogramme lashes out with crashing metallic noisiness a la Mogwai -- although we think it sounds more authentically heavy like the Melvins or a Hydrahead metalcore band. And it *really* works as an album: the dynamic changes are not unpleasantly distracting; they're as skillfully executed as on Radiohead's "OK Computer", and the climaxes come exactly when you most need them too. There are also judiciously wielded violins and cello soaring above the warm guitars, some genuinely death metal, hoarse vocal roars, and guitar parts that could be from an authentic '70s prog or metal album. At one moment the tight discipline of Shellac, the next the delicate melodies of Sparklehorse, and then some sheer black metal creepiness...wow. Some might call their style a gimmick, though we can't when it's so satisfying and brilliantly executed!
So this record should appeal to fans of all of the bands mentioned above, plus to fans of bands that are doing similar dynamic genre blends like emo-metalcore outfits Poison the Well, From Autumn To Ashes, and Cave In. Indeed, Aerogramme's debut "A Story In White" -- a favorite around here -- made good use of the same dynamics, but rather than simply mixing up their indie-rock with some surprisingly metal moments as on that disc, Aereogramme here sound like a genuine hybrid...like maybe it's the other way around, they're a metalcore band toying with utterly gorgeous indie-pop songwriting.
From local musician Wayne Smith comes this *excellent* little slip of a 25-minute album. A record this genre-hopping might in lesser hands be a chore to listen to, but with Aero-Mic'd the first few minutes are just so good that you easily put your trust in
Dax Riggs and Mike Sanchez of the criminally overlooked Acid Bath (RIP) continue to rock with the metal of their former (and much loved) outfit tempered with Ziggy Stardust-era Bowie and slithery Iggy production. Plus the emotional intensity and murky melodicism of Jeff Buckley. Excellent! A runner-up for album of the week, actually. This proves that "classic rock" wasn't only made in the '70s. Music to drive your Camaro to.
They got their start as a hippie commune band, with ties to Guru Guru, Tangerine Dream, and Amon Duul. Their debut, "Malesch" (Arabic for "it doesn't matter, take it easy"), is a true cosmic Krautrock classic, blending the spacey psych of Pink Floyd and fellow krautrockers Ash Ra Tempel and Popul Vuh with a flair for Eastern "exoticism". Plus, in the intertwining guitars, you'll find some hints of the American West Coast psych sound (yes, even a little Grateful Dead -- but don't let that scare you off). The album was recorded in 1972 not long after the band was sent on a tour of the Middle East by the Goethe Institute, and incorporates field recordings (decades before the likes of Godspeed You Black Emperor!) from their trip: the bustle of Cairo streets, desert winds, calls to prayer, friendly airline pilots... These tapes are a key element of this record's appeal (along with their sheer talent for jamming and their synth and electronic experimentation). Oh, and some great Hammond organ sounds too. Basically, this is a fantastic album of mostly instrumental psych / drone / ethnic rock, that's generally mellow but powerful too. Whether to the Great Pyramids of Egypt (where the album cover was shot) or to inner space, "Malesch" portrays a true trip indeed. So recommended.
Now that many of you have discovered the rich and funky sounds of Ethiopia circa mid-1970s, here's a deeper look into the career of Mahmoud Ahmed, master crooner and national Ethiopian treasure. Almaz is his very first album (from 1973), which to our knowledge has never been released in Europe or America before today. It's unbelievably good -- full of impassioned soul-stirring vocals, funky horns, and gorgeous melodies. Trust us: you will be so happy with this cd! An excerpt from the liner notes says it better than we can: "For many years everything we knew about Mahmoud Ahmed (and Ethiopian music in general) was limited to the cult album Ere Mela Mela, recorded in 1975 but released for the first time in Europe in 1986. The first eruption of this brassy, electric urban pop, swinging and hypnotic, heart-rending and funky, so unusual, so different from anything else coming out of the African continent, this musical UFO long remained our only glimpse into Ethiopian groove. Mahmoud's first LP Almaz, recorded two years before 'Ere Mela Mela' now bears new witness to the talent of one of the greatest Ethiopian artists of the past 35 years."
One of the best in an amazing series!!! This reissue of Ere Mela Mela (previously on Crammed I think) is an essential purchase if you dig the grooves of the James Brown of Ethiopia, the amazing Mahmoud Ahmed.
Finally a domestic, single disc reissue of the first two albums Tony Allen released under his own name in 1975 and '77. Legendary drummer for Nigerian visionary Fela Kuti's band Afrika '70, Allen has often been called a co-founder of Afrobeat (along with Fela). In fact Allen's drum parts were often the only element that Fela did not pre-score. These records swing and stutter and groove and majorly kick ass, stretching themselves out often to 15 minutes or more (and you never want it to end anyway). In addition to the saxophones, trumpets, congas, bass, maracas, the extraordinary standout guitar work is very hooky to these western ears, which is mostly why I like it so much, especially on the song "Jealousy", and there are lots of drum solos, more than on the Fela records. Really great -- listen to the soundclip and know there's more where that came from. Essential to any Afrobeat collection, and also a great place to start!
Soon after Munich's hippie commune krautrockers Amon Duul formed in the late '60s, some of the more musically inclined formed Amon Duul II whose early releases include the masterpieces Yeti (1970), Tanz der Lemminge (1971), etc. Wolf City is just their fifth album, recorded in 1972, and it's fucking fantastic and I can't believe I never heard it before. It's a little bit less experimental than earlier projects, a little more song oriented, but that may be a good thing if prog-flavored German psychedelia is a new cuppa tea for ya. (My co-worker Byram, in fact, found Wolf City a little too Yes-y for his taste -- so listen to the soundclips before buying.) There are seven tracks here, and each one shifts mood slightly -- from the epic masterpiece opener to a single gentle instrumental to spacerock jams, all the arrangements totally unpredictable and interesting. There's heavy prog-style guitar, pleasantly jangly (what sounds like 12-string?) guitar, screeching violin, deep declamatory bass, sweetly macabre piano and organ, plus all manner of weird chuckles, grunts and choir-like ahhhhs. So good! Wolf City is as epic, hummably memorable, kickass, and heavy as Pink Floyd & Genesis, more chaotic and messy than Can, more accessible and full-sounding than Cluster. If you've never heard Amon Duul II before, this is a fine place to start, as are any of the abovementioned albums. Strongly recommended! Windy's new favorite album. In a tie with Goblin's equally prog-gy Il Viaggio del Bagarazzo Mark for hands down Best Reissue in my 2002 year end tops list.
Pretty insanely catchy cock rock, super anthemic and dumb, as only the Bulb label (and now, we're told, Rick Rubin's American label!) can provide. Skull art on cover, tight pants, greasy hair, songtitles like "We Want Fun" and "Music or Die". Somewhere
What the hell happened here? The Anniversary has poised themselves as the heir apparents to the emo / power pop throne now occupied by labelmates the Get Up Kids, yet with their second album "Your Majesty," these kids from Lawrence, Kansas suddenly think they're Noel and Liam, constructing a bombastic album of baroque pop with lots of harmonizing choruses, extended guitar solos, dramatic piano chords, and distant nods to The Pixies and Supertramp. This record was a real slow burner. In the beginning we all hated it, wondering what happened to our emo pop anniversaries, but the more we listen, the more we began to understand. I began catching Jim or Cup listening to it when they thought no one was the wiser. And Windy is pretty much playing it nonstop in her car: http://aquariusrecords.org/windyscar.html. So now, we give it a thumbs up. The only bummer is the one guy singer who whispers in a earnest croon and ends up sounding lame. Outside of that, they're probably the best Brit pop band America has. A few painfully public inter-band squabbles and loads of coke and the sky's the limit!
Sometimes the hardest records to review are the good ol' regular rock albums. Whether it's good or not, saying "2 guitars, drums, bass" just isn't scintillating reading. So how to express how thoroughly enjoyable this new Anomoanan record is. Hm. And this from a band that's, well, never made such a good impression on me before -- I found their earlier efforts unremarkable but with "Asleep Many Years...", the band's __th record, it's all come together. Led by Ned Oldham (yep, brother to Will Oldham, who makes several prettily broken-voiced appearances here, and producer Paul Oldham), the band plays with a tuneful confidence resulting in an instantly classic sound -- the music is a familiar AM-radio sort of lite rock, with lovely warbly harmonies, a southern country rock vibe reminding me of my favorite Bread, America, Eagles and Neil Young tracks. Yeah, it's that good! Excellent, accessible hooks augmented with the occasional sweet cowbell clock-clocking, twangy slide guitar, organ and sweet viola. Give the soundclips a try -- the songs will instantly grab you, if'n you're inclined to love the abovementioned bands as well as Tom Petty, Robbie Fulks, Handsome Family, Richard Buckner, etc. And DEFINITELY get this if you're a Will Oldham fan at all -- it's like Palace only "easier to talk to". Recommended by Windy and Cup!
The mad-scientist of electronica - Richard D James aka Aphex Twin - released I Care Because You Do in 1995; and now in 2012, that classic electronica album gets a 2lp reissue by way of the 1972 label, who also recently reissued Aphex's Selected Ambient Works Vol. Two on triple lp.
This album's single "Ventolin" stood as one of the more cantankerous tracks that RDJ had recorded to date. A harsh, tinnitus-inducing squeal permeates the sequencing of clunky rhythms and dum-dum melodies of that single thumbing its noise at everybody who took the whole Intelligent Dance Music thing way too seriously. At the time, the track was a blatant provocation, and after all these years, it still sticks out as a grotesque distortion, with the album moving somewhat like a palindrome around that track - progressing up to that nasty piece of electronics from more stately and subdued tracks before reversing course. One of the tracks that brackets "Ventolin" is the majestic "Icct Hedral" which spirals around an orchestration worked out by Phillip Glass for Aphex Twin, with James girding the cauldron of repetitive woodwinds and strings with his trademarked crunching breakbeats and phase-shifting parametric filter sweeps. The sweaty acid-breakcore track "Come On, You Slags!" is the other bookend to "Ventolin" with more introspective abstractions pooling on either side with plenty of counterpointing rhythmic complexities tossed in for good measure. It was on this record that the Aphex sense of humor - with its broad spectrum from the strange to the village idiot - first came into its own as a unique facet to Aphex Twin's vocabulary. So much of this work still sounds amazing after all these years, and it's also great to see this on vinyl again finally, too! (Even moreso since it seems the cd version has gone out of print.)
The return of the most polished and shiny of the Elephant 6 pop groups. The songs are slower, more layered, and more substantial than on previous Apples records, which is a good thing: for example, if you like Strawberry Fields Forever you will LOVE this album. In fact, any fan of the Beatles should welcome this record with open arms -- yes it is that good. Robert Schneider's voice is even more perfectly juicy than ever before. Highly recommended.
Though Lawrence, Kansas based Appleseed Cast has been around since 1998 they haven't been as widely heard as their contemporaries The Get Up Kids and The Anniversary, and I would have imagined that the release of "Low Level Owl" volumes one and two would
The thing that really kicks a hole in our pants with these albums is the obvious love and meticulous care that went into recording them. The band apparently spent three months recording all the tracks; laying down the initial tracks and then sculpting them with additional overdubs and extensive tweaking, even miking leaves blowing along the driveway outside the studio and including it as a segue between two songs. In fact, both albums are obviously meant to be listened to in their entirety, with nary a second of silence between songs, as tracks bleed and drift into one another. Volume two begins, quite ingeniously and literally, where volume one leaves off -- with a brief reprise of the ending track. It could be me, but volume two seems to contain more Mogwai style extended jams and instrumental musical forays and experiments. So if you wish to start with a more "pop" oriented record, choose volume one and if you want more of a drifting and pensive record, choose volume two. Chances are that you'll wanna pick up both eventually anyhow. Everytime we play this in the store, someone buys a copy or two.
Though Lawrence, Kansas based Appleseed Cast has been around since 1998 they haven't been as widely heard as their contemporaries The Get Up Kids and The Anniversary, and I would have imagined that the release of "Low Level Owl" volumes one and two would
The thing that really kicks a hole in our pants with these albums is the obvious love and meticulous care that went into recording them. The band apparently spent three months recording all the tracks; laying down the initial tracks and then sculpting them with additional overdubs and extensive tweaking, even miking leaves blowing along the driveway outside the studio and including it as a segue between two songs. In fact, both albums are obviously meant to be listened to in their entirety, with nary a second of silence between songs, as tracks bleed and drift into one another. Volume two begins, quite ingeniously and literally, where volume one leaves off -- with a brief reprise of the ending track. It could be me, but volume two seems to contain more Mogwai style extended jams and instrumental musical forays and experiments. So if you wish to start with a more "pop" oriented record, choose volume one and if you want more of a drifting and pensive record, choose volume two. Chances are that you'll wanna pick up both eventually anyhow. Everytime we play this in the store, someone buys a copy or two.
This is the actualization of Edward Said's orientalist theories into a musical context of feverish drum & bass breaks compounded with a stellar use of antiquated 60's fuzz guitar and impassioned political rants. ADF makes Atari Teenage Riot's upper middle class politics seem very weak in comparison.
Ethiopia was the site of some of the most beautiful yet sadly forgotten music in the 60's and 70's. This compilation takes some of the best tracks from the enterprising Amha Records. This label specialized in recording unusually catchy and groovy pop songs that are not dissimilar to late 60's Jamaican rocksteady fused with jazz signatures and Ethiopian folk, plus plenty of James Brown funk.
This disc features the all instrumental "Ethio Jazz" by Mulatu Atatke. We don't know of anyone who's heard this and not fallen absolutely in love with it. Recommended without reservation!
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With a title such as that you know the music is ferociously cool. Local boy and frequent Mo'Wax engineer/remix-savant Dan Nakamura recently broke out with this exciting ep. He says it pushes OUTward the boundaries of (american) hip hop, a very good thing to do, no? If you dig the Dr. Octagon record, then you'll like this one -- Dan along with Kool Keith are the principals on both albums.
In general I can't really handle female vocalists of the overly-breathy school of emotiveness. You know, the kind of voice that's become such a mainstream-adult-radio staple -- the Jewel / Fiona Apple axis. Their whispered voices are breaking oh so emotionally
This very pleasant, quiet half-hour EP from the Georgia-based duo has become a favorite of Cup and Windy. The title track "November" is so astonishingly pretty that I was struck the same way as when I first heard Mazzy Star -- by how instantly accessible and melodic it is. In fact its chorus positively reminds us of ABBA's "The Winner Takes It All".
The delicately plucked acoustic guitars are embellished with piano, steel drums, and nice, subtle stereo separation effects. Features a Townes Van Zandt cover. Together with their producer Andy Lemasters (of Now It's Overhead, another AQ-fave), Azure Ray have also toured as Bright Eyes' band.
Now released domestically!...When we first heard the Badly Drawn Boy, we couldn't believe our ears. Who was this guy? He was like a Britpop Beck; sort of Beck-like voice, twisted pop sensibilities, beautifully Sentridoh-style home recording, and songs that kill. Well, we still don't exactly know who he is, except for the fact that he's the Mercury Prize winner, but at least now there's more than two impossible to find eps. Surprisingly, for his first full length, BDB has abandoned the lo-fi bedroom sound, and lots of his Beck-isms and created a lush, hyper-produced pop masterpiece. Somewhere between Elliott Smith, Radiohead, and Beck. Right off the bat, the first song is a spare arrangement for strings and oboes and cornets. In fact the whole record is dotted with swelling string parts, horns, accordions, bleeps and bloops and super creative production. This is a weird and beautiful (albeit commercial, compared to his earlier recordings and remixes) record, definitely for fans of Beck, Elliott Smith, Radiohead, Quasi, Built to Spill, etc. Imagine Beck or Elliott Smith, if they grew up in England, listening to Radiohead and Oasis, and cut their teeth doing remixes for a who's who of British pop/dance groups, and put a record out on MoWax. It's kind of like that, but not exactly. But it *is* totally great.
Devendra Banhart -- who appears to be living his life as an indie-rock gipsy touring with whomever and squatting wherever, including a stint wowing locals here in SF -- crafts his neo-folk songs with the primitive instrumentation of voice and acoustic guitar, spanning a vast spectrum of fragmented emotions through a manic-depressive persona that can be as beautifully charming as it can be terrifyingly devastating. Michael Gira, who released this album through his Young God label, accurately described Banhart's voice with its skewed vibrato and unnerving warble as somewhere in between the magical voices of Marc Bolan, Karen Dalton, Syd Barrett, Tiny Tim, Daniel Johnston, and Nick Drake; and fortunately, Banhart uses that voice to tell a wholly unique set of stories that hold a succinct poetry. Hastily stitched from bizarre stream of consciousness associations and absurdist conditional clauses, Banhart's lyrics expand the realm of possibility into psychosexual surrealism. On occasion, Banhart's tales are anthropomorphic love songs, wistfully dreaming of archaic steam ships and the state of Michigan (yes, he pines for Michigan) with all of sexual cravings and romantic nuances of a young boy first pierced by Cupid's arrow; yet on other occasion, Banhart gnashes his teeth with such existential confusion that the targets of his epithets are blurred by his bilious rage. Within Banhart's language, reality has been realized as a swollen mass of malformed emotions compounded by the urgency that resonates within his voice.
Upon listening to this album, I've had the recurring, sinking feeling either that Banhart is destined to star in an upcoming Harmony Korine film or that he will be dead in a few years as victim of an unspecified gruesome tragedy. As I've tried and failed to assign such distinctly odd critical-doomspeak within various arguments and generalized thesis about the perception of the separation between art and life, I mention it because Banhart -- unlike any artist whom I've come across -- has been able to provoke such controversial thoughts. Far from me to wish Banhart or anybody ill-will, but true manifestations of horror defy logic and are very rare indeed. And this, gentle reader, is the real deal.
If you recall, Andee began his review of Woven Hand's album with the bold statement: "I hate to gush, but gush I must, this is my record of the year. Done deal." As for me (Jim, along with Marcy and Windy), the debut from Devendra Banhart needs to be given serious consideration as a contender for record of the year 2002.
Boy do Beachwood Sparks want to be the Byrds. From the psychedelic cover art to the super acid-drenched photo collage foldout poster, they're wearing their peace pendants and worn-in denim like they're conjuring the ghost of Gram Parsons. And hey, they do it really well. Recorded by Thom Monahan (Scud Mountain Boys), the music is syrupy sweet in a good way, without being fake or too
Have fun pointing out how each song sounds like a different indie rock band. The winner so far: "Tomorrow Never Knows" sounds EXACTLY like Bugskull. This comp is much much better than the first volume.
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A truly amazing document of a solo set performed by percussionist Han Bennink, long acknowledged as one of the founders of European improvised music. Full of exuberance, life, humor, this record scales the heights of unpredictability and variety as Bennink alternately plays unidentified pieces of metal, shimmering cymbals, tablas, rat-a-tat-tat staccato drums, clarinets, and accompanies himself with vocal warbles, muffled quacks, yells... This record is 27 years old but sounds fresher and more alive than much of what was released last week! First time on cd. Highly recommended.
The Beta Band are a quartet featuring three Scots and one Brit. Using regular rock instrumentation supplemented by trumpet, piano, jew's harp, bird calls, judicious vinyl scratching, and a weird keyboard contraption that is blown into by means of a long flexible tube, the band comes up with a sound that's, well, like Pink Floyd mixed with Tall Dwarfs if they were really into Mo'Wax. Specifically, Beta Band mix echoey vocals a la The Dark Side of the Moon with loose, tinkly percussive elements and meaty, satisfying guitar strumming, then add a layer of bass groove that's reinforced by rhythmic vocal loops. It's a sound that is at once completely original and unabashedly experimental, yet familiar and immediately accessible.
While many of the reviews of The Beta Band have compared them favorably to Beck (shorthand for saying that they've got command of a wide range of influences that they recombine into their own sound), let's get specific. They are at home with honest-to-goodness psychedelia, synths, beatboxes, sampling, exotica... the list goes on. Combine this breadth and depth of musical chops with their exquisite sense of arrangement, and you begin to see the potential of this group.
--excerpted from Windy's Bay Guardian column.
Wonderful! This French singer/songwriter's emotional, serious songs are delivered in a breathy, delicate manner that will DEFINITELY appeal to fans of Belle & Sebastian, although Bertrand's unique style isn't as sticky sweet. Highly recommended!
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Gorgeous Bartok violin duets played and sung by the wonderful Iva Bittova and Dorothea Kellerova, two sprightly Czech women who roll their own cigarettes. (And there are enclosed photo cards to prove it, along with a red feather to complement the fancy red velvet packaging.) Minor key, impressionistic, and stark, like the soundtrack to Truffaut film. Looks great, sounds great. Really lovely.
Copenhagen's rock scene in the early 1970s was so small and fertile that bands formed and reformed in various combinations of the same people. Case in point -- Blast Furnace came together in 1970, released a single great LP in 1971, and by 1972 3/4 of Blast Furnace had joined the band Culpepper's Orchard. It's kind of amazing that this record has been lost to all but the most die hard fans of Danish progressive rock, because it's so clearly great. The angst-filled (almost Faust-ish) vocals of Brit singer Tom McEwan take turns with super-expressive organ lines. And there are flutes eveywhere (which fills our flute obsessive Andee with joy).
And the arrangements are really good, making the most of minor key melodies so that nothing need be overstated. There aren't extended wanky instrumental passages here, for a prog band Blast Furnace edited themselves so well, leaving us wanting more. And, in fact, there is more -- a non-album track intended as a single has also been included on this cd. The disc starts off as classic and firece seventies prog, with complex melodic passages and some instrumental spacy jamming, but as the record progresses, the record veers dramatically from mostly instrumental prog, to super dramatic, almost goofy (in a good way) balladeering. The vocalist's deep baritone waxes poetic on ridiculous and far out subject matters, like the plight of Toytown, or poor sad Bobo the Clown. Sounds silly, and it sort of is, but it's really really good. Reminds us a little of AQ faves Paternoster (although not nearly as insane) or some super melodramatic seventies singer songwriter. But the combination of heartfelt ballads and searing prog action make this a weird and great find. Windy's new favorite record.
The Japanese/Italian trio's last album Fake Can Be Just As Good should have been the album Sonic Youth made right after Daydream Nation. Fortunately, their latest album proves that they are no longer a Sonic Youth rip-off band. And for that matter, what they've grown into is quite something to behold. On In An Expression Of The Inexpressible, the band's fourth full length, lead female vocalist Kazu Makino has honed her pipes into a distinctly expressive wonder... taming its former shrillness into something very childlike and otherworldly. Noisy melodies of angular guitars, modest keyboards, and a tight rhythm section come across as desperate yet beautiful epics. Very highly recommended.
I came to love folksinger Kath Bloom's frail, plaintive, birdlike voice through her recordings with the avant guitarist Loren Mazzacane Connors -- the pair made 5 gorgeous LPs in the '70s which are no longer available, but from which a current best-of cd has been compiled. (Highly recommended.) I've since been sort of obsessed with tracking down Kath Bloom and have finally succeeded. She is still making music, thank goodness, and thus we're proud to be carrying her self-released Come Here cd-r (I think we might be the only store to do so). Kath's voice is as fragile and trembly as ever, and the instruments accompanying here are likewise light -- airy guitar, harmonica, bittersweet fiddle. Most of the pieces are from the mid-'90s. Very nice, but an acquired taste, so make sure to listen to the soundclips.
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GORGEOUS. Windy's new favorite record. Folksinger Kath Bloom's frail, plaintive voice is perfectly suited to Mazzacane's meandering folk guitar. Here's what Mazzacane says in the liner notes: "These recordings were made between 1981 and 1984. I produced and released them on the St Joan label in editions of 200 copies. There were 5 LPs total, from which the best songs were taken for this release. While Bloom's songs were clearly in the 'new folk' style, my free-form playing and vocalizations were too unsettling for most folk music fans. The music therefore received more acceptance in the small avant music scene than in the much larger folk scene of the time."
Long-awaited vinyl reissue of one of the dreamiest and influential records of the nineties has finally arrived! We were sure we must have written a review sometime back in the day, but its 1998 release long predated the list, and whenever there was a subsequent reissue, we only mentioned what an essential and classic album it is, never really needing to quantify why it was so, because basically we have to assume everyone knows about it, right? But fifteen years on, let's try to put it in words how much we love this record and what it means when we have said in so many following reviews since this came out about that ubiquitous Boards of Canada "sound".
Having released a couple of obscure singles and a hard-to find full length, Boards of Canada seemed to have come out of nowhere when they made their major-label debut. Named after and inspired by the seventies documentary film company The National Film Board of Canada, this band of Scottish brothers Marcus Eoin and Mike Sandison created one of the first IDM outfits that built off the futuristic electronic and downtempo beatscapery of genre pioneers Autechre and Aphex Twin while infusing their music with a warm, nostalgic and sun-dappled melancholy. It was hard at first to pinpoint what created that distinct nostalgic feeling, because back then not many folks were as clued into the world of library music (essentially instrumental soundtrack music made by private companies for use in commercial and industrial films including the educational-minded National Film Board of Canada) as we are now. Many of the melodies and themes on Music Has the Right to Children seem to be lifted straight from those elementary school educational films, the type that inhabited our childhoods as well. The music gives off a warbled lilting pastoral vibe that prismatizes into a sunburst of kaleidoscopic reverie, evoking memories of hip educational graphics of basic science concepts like geometrical forms, color spectrums and weather patterns that would allude to a larger sense of wonder that we, as adult listeners, no longer seemed to have. How it was made, whether through instrumental musicianship, a sophisticated sampling and filtering process, or a combination of both remains mysterious today. A few years back when the philosophic concept of Hauntology (a past premonition of a future that never was, to put it very simply) was being bandied about a lot with groups like Broadcast & The Focus Group and The Caretaker, many have spoken of this album as a key musical touchstone. It does indeed have a strange quality of being both of and beyond its time, a quality in turn that continues to bedazzle, beguile and bewitch. Essential!
Boards of Canada fans take note! Outside of solipsistic IDM circles, Bola has, for the most part, been forgotten due to the overwhelming popularity of Boards Of Canada -- an electronica duo just as good as a Bola who got the fortunate break of landing on
Also, a word about the cover art -- it's so beautiful that several of the AQ-staff bought it on vinyl just cos it's so gorgeous. Since the designer is not credited, we'll just assume it's the Bola folks who put together these incredibly detailed, full color illustrations of fantastical insect-like creatures that have been created by careful collaging of imagery seemingly lifted from under the sea or inside the body. Just great looking!
We will soon have two versions of this album on vinyl -- both are nice gatefolds holding two lps. The cheaper one is black vinyl, the $24 one features two gorgeous pictures discs. You may reserve copies.
The new album from Will Oldham & friends is simply wonderful. And we know we rave about Oldham a lot, from his work with Palace Bros to the solo material, but really we mean it -- this is one of his best records. In fact, I think that without the charming but sometimes syrupy twang prevalent on his earlier efforts, Master and Everyone has finally launched Oldham into the same lofty, hallowed territory as other iconoclastic folk practitioners such as Townes Van Zandt. Yeah, this is that good.
The new record has the same kind of low-key charm as his last offering, Ease On Down the Road, although while that record had a sunny back-porch vibe and moments of sly, naughty humor, the laconic, mellow sound of Master And Everyone is tinged with melancholy -- as is much of Oldham's recorded output -- but doesn't try to reach into the inky realms of cathartic intensity found on I See A Darkness (which is one of the best records he's made). Instead, the feeling is familiar and comforting, as Oldham wraps a honeyed falsetto or low, secretive whisper around distant stories of love and lonelines, filtered through the phrasing of early god-fearing folk balladeers. Female harmonies add to the sweetness. Gone is Oldham's faux Appalachian hillbilly guise, and the tenuous, always-cracking vocal warble, and the sometimes pointlessly peurile lyrics, and in its place is a warm, muted, dark folk record. Very reminiscent of seventies British folk, especially Nick Drake, with gorgeous female vocals perfectly complementing Oldham's warm languorous voice. A perfect drifiting off record.
Probably the best testimonial to the goodness of this record is not the fact that the AQ staffers who're already Bonnie Billy fans like it, but the fact that Andee, a.k.a. staunch Oldham naysayer (likes nothing after the Palace Bros debut), LOVES this record too. And that's saying somethin'!
Excellent! Now this is the sort of stuff Mo'Wax should be putting out, this is what those yuppie lounge bars should be playing instead of fuckin' Kruder and Dorfmeister. Boom Bip may be familiar to you through his Four Tet remix and collaborations with Dose One (Them, cloudDead), but you'd be forgiven for thinking he might be on Mo'Wax -- this record's got all the trademark spacious open wide sonic vistas, echoey breakbeats, movie dialog samples, hip hop reverence, and melody galore. A different take on the whole rock meets electronica thang that only a few bands can pull off well (Fridge, Tarwater, DJ Shadow when he's sampling guitars), Boom Bip mixes space rock with electronica absolutely perfectly, and grounds it with hip hop, lest the thing get too cerebral. There are slow breakbeats, sweet chamber strings, throbbing epic bass, dubby echo, unabashedly rock-based chord progressions, and eccentric scratching. Plus lots of dynamic changes -- the record never gets boring. There's even a finishing track that makes use of Felt-like or Durutti Column-ish tinny guitar. Now, it's not a "weird" record, not even ultra challenging, but it does what it does perfectly. I am very impressed!
Oh, it must also be said that this disc has got artwork we're fairly wetting our pants over -- brown coffee cup stains on neutral cardboard, with gold foil pressed graffiti logo, and a die cut thru which shows the barcode. And then the insert incorporates the barcode stripes into all these pretty loops spelling out Boom Bip. Wow.
AKA "Vision Recreation by EYE". The fourth installment in the R.E.B.O.R.E. series of remixes isn't necessarily a "remix" of Boredoms material, but a reconstruction, or recreation as the title suggests. Contained are seven wonderful tracks of blissed out
The domestic version of this kick ass Boredoms album finally sees the light of day! Far less manic than their previous spazzcore albums you loved in the past, the Boredoms' new focus on studio manipulations is intense and artistically successful. Layers of bombastic guitar noises swell and give way to insane bursts of tape manipulation along with the wax and wane of desperate screams and urgent percussion. Super AE is a rancid psychedelic experience that could be a chance meeting on the dissecting table between Amon Duul and Nurse With Wound.
f you've seen the Boredoms live and don't think you could sit through a disc of it, know that this album builds on the studio experiments of their recent SuperRoots series; it's not Yamantaka Eye jumping around anymore -- he's sitting in the cock-pit, entering your earholes with intents to purple-shag-carpet-bomb your sense of reality. Mad Jack became mad scientist.
Although Japanese import version came packaged in an elaborate day-glo oversized plastic box, don't worry: the artwork on this domestic cd is pretty damn cool complete with nifty Eye Yamantaka magic marker art!
"Heavy Rocks" is -- to state the obvious if you've heard it -- a more than apt title for this newest (and long-awaited) collection of tuneage from everyone's favorite Japanese heavy rockers, Boris. Yes, the thunderous Tokyo trio of Takeshi, Wata, and Atsuo are back! We promised last year in our write-up of their amazing (but uncharacteristically mostly mellow) album "Flood" that Boris' next disc would be a return to the ROCK. And it is. No acoustic stuff here, nor even the lengthy droning dirges in which they have also indulged in the past. Nope, this one simply rocks hard and heavy, start to finish. Fans know that every Boris album is different, and this one can perhaps be characterized as Boris' "stoner rock" effort. Total Kyuss action! Still, with some grizzled nods to their all-time heroes, the Melvins. The first track, "Heavy Friends", is VERY Melvins (metallic, thudding, glacial) -- and even has a walk-on spoken contribution from Melvins drummer Dale Crover's ex-wife Lori (of Acid King). Speaking of heavy friends, guests pop up all over this release, actually -- there's some lead guitar by Eddie Legend of Japanese garage/rockabilly band The Mad 3, a track with analog synth twiddle courtesy Maso Yamazaki (Masonna/Christine 23 Onna), and another with some laptop computer fuckery from Masami "Merzbow" Akita (who also just completed a full-on collaborative album with Boris, see nearby for a review of that opus, the drone yin to this album's rock yang).
With or without the help of noiseniks Merzbow and Masonna, noisy, fuzzed-out psychedelic atmospheres abound here, but generally in the context of high energy, superheavy rockin'. Really, the album relaxes only for the spaced-out guitar bliss of "Soft Edge" halfway through. Tracks like "Korosu", "Dyna-Soar", "Death Valley", "Rattlesnake", and "1970" are all catchy, riff-laden showcases for Boris' brand of kick-ass rock n' roll. Even if you aren't into stoner rock, you should check this out because it easily surpasses most of the other bands operating within the genre. Irresistable. Honestly.
AQ faves Boris (masters of Melvins-esque slow-motion dirge metal) team up with sometime AQ fave Masami Akita (who as Merzbow basically invented 'noise' as a genre) to unleash this three track cd of monster drone! Both camps represent with some of their most gorgeous work. Boris contribute what sounds like the prettier more minimal stuff from their moody album "Flood", with guitar only evident on one track, and even then it's slowed down, stretched out and buried under a thick blanket of Merzbow-y haze and Boris-y rumble. Akita keeps his noise side in check (although there are some truly caustic moments) opting instead for dark, processed low end with the occasional sonic flare. Created using guitar, e-bow, space echo, Powerbook and feedback conduction (!), "Megatone" finds itself situated closer to the drones of Coleclough or Karkowski than it does to the metallic pummel of the Melvins or the Corrupted. The opening track is a deep 20+ minute rumble, with white noise spread thinly above, while Akita's Powerbook gradually becomes more and more sonically intrusive and the processed guitars form subtle melodic overtones, throbbing and pulsing in ultra slow motion. The second track is constructed out of far away, psychedelic, Keiji Haino-esque guitar leads, buried under some Merzbowian ear piercing skree, allowing Akita to unleash some of that 'noise' he is so famous for. The final track lets the guitars do the talking one more time with huge walls of distortion, still heavily reverbed and distant sounding, but much more serene and almost ambient, with Merzbow's noise contributions much more complimetary and distinctly less harsh. A massive, gorgeous totally enthralling collaboration from two of the most exciting artists in music today!
Seattle-based duo The Bran Flakes have put together another cherry of an album. Sonic plunderers who must have ridiculous amounts of thrift-store $1 records, The Bran Flakes painstakingly yet assuredly cut everything up -- macabre children's songs, sleigh bells, latin percussive rattles, afro cuban drumming, tooting horns, minor key strings, occasional drum 'n bass, bad disco, some goofy approximations of dub, wurlitzer organ, noir film samples, oompah oompah in the left channel, funky drummer-style breakbeat on the right -- and arrange everything into precise sonic juxtapositions, resulting in a very confident and enjoyable trip from beginning to end (in fact the end is a three minute long recitation of people's names, jesus how long did it take them to cut *that* stuff together?)
The album's highest point comes when they cut up (Terry Riley "You're Nogood"-style!) everyone's favorite muppets Kermit and Fozzie Bear singing "Movin' right along...". It's so frickin' wonderful and happy go lucky -- can't you just see 'em in the Studebaker? While most comparisons to fellow cut 'n pasters involve names like Wobbly and Negativland, I think the group will fit nicely right next to your Kid Koala tape, your People Like Us cd, and maybe even your 12" collection of solemn DJ Shadow, who uses the same tools -- vinyl -- but never cracks a smile, whereas The Bran Flakes are all about hilarity. Look at what moog pioneer Jean Jacques Perrey says about 'em:
"I enjoyed your record very much, it is so fresh, so cool, made for people who have a 'child soul' and at the same time perfectly elaborated harmonically and technically with some funny winks to other composers."
Recommended for the lighthearted!
If Jim O'Rourke wasn't so afflicted with attention deficit disorder, if Boards of Canada weren't so s-l-o-w in making new records, if the Champs weren't on tour all the time -- maybe they all coulda gotten together and made a record as pretty as this one. Brian and Chris are a coolly eclectic local duo whose record is so fresh, gentle, accomplished and unhurried that it's taken us by surprise. When an album is this eclectic we are usually a little suspicious -- but Brian & Chris' "Vectors" album totally works. Bravo.
Starting with a shuffling bass groove layered over with atmospherics full of texture and grit, the record would at first seem to be yet more popular electronics in the vein of Mouse on Mars or Boards of Canada. But before you know it the electronics have been replaced by echoing acoustic blues guitar that's foregrounded right in your eardrum, while tinny jungle beats cavort way in the background, used more as texture than as booty movers. It's a nice combination you'd like to hear longer, but before long chiming, fingerpicked guitars accompany a lilting, ethereal female voice, soon to be followed by angular shards of art-post-rock very similar to Gastr del Sol (in a good way, not pretentious at all). And as if that weren't fun enough, by the end of the album the perfectly seamless segueways between the genre-bending tracks have placed you squarely in the middle of a Champs-style rock guitar workout. Wow. Highly recommended!
The dearly departed Jeff Buckley left behind a legacy of several perfect albums and EPs, but such was his talent -- heartbreakingly emotive vocals; soaring songwriting; unusual, complex chords filled with subtlety -- that while he was alive, a rabid track-trading network of unreleased material sprung up amongst his most ardent fans. Acknowledging their hunger for more material, Buckley's family has begun releasing much of this stellar music. This legacy edition of Buckley's best album, Grace, spreads over two discs, and we have to say that if you already own the single-disc Grace, you should just trade it in right now. That's how good these extra tracks are. There are 13 rarities, 8 of them previously unreleased, including a sweet, genuine take on Dylan's "Mama, You've Been on My Mind"; a tender version of Nina Simone's lament "Other Woman"; a must-hear-to-believe version of Big Star's "Kang-A-Roo" stretched out to an ecstatic, super epic 14 minutes; and the MC5's "Kick Out the Jams". And if that wasn't enough, there's a third DVD disc in the package containing an newly updated, expanded version of a "making of" Grace documentary, five videos from the album, and a discography. AQ is often wary about re-releases, smelling a rat when it seems that money is the objective, but in this case, while a too-early death halted Buckely's life, at least his music is still slowly being made available to his fans. We miss him.
In the time since the late great Jeff Buckley's debut album Grace, many of us have come to know and love his music. This posthumously-released collection of tracks is not throwaway material; rather it is a lovely compilation of soundboard tapes, studio demos of now-beloved songs like "Grace", and live material. All of it features downtown New York avant musician Gary Lucas, who Buckley met in his early twenties at a tribute concert to Buckley's father Tim. Lucas' shimmering, moaning, yowling guitar lines are a *stunning* counterpoint to Buckley's similarly haunting voice and guitar. Less of the thick, full sound from Buckley's solo work -- more twanging, resonating guitar picking, lighter renditions of songs that made it onto Grace... the effect is very pleasant and may even serve to garner a few new fans in addition to showing established Buckley fans another side to the man's aesthetic. Atmospheric, whooshing guitar, meditative whisperings, a joyful Sam Cooke-style soul cover, many tracks sans drums. A couple songs have a pronounced blues tone and there's even a fiery punk(-ish) number! This record is absolutely gorgeous and a worthy addition to your Buckley collection.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Japanese female quartet mix power pop and funk and electronic noodling into a surprisingly appealing whole. Bonus points for throwing Gregg Turkington's "Great Phone Calls" pranks into the mix, barely there but so very there.
We gotta hand it to Tigerbeat6 head honcho Miguel for giving this disc a domestic release and price. Released in the U.K. by Rephlex, "Pressure" is the second outing by Kevin Martin under the moniker of The Bug. While this guise may be a recent one for Mr. Martin, he's not a newcomer to the scene. You may already be familiar with his previous projects Techno Animal, Curse of the Golden Vampire, God and Ice (certainly not a curriculum vitae to be sneezed at). With The Bug though, Kevin attacks our lower intestinal tracts with some of the best hardcore dancehall we've heard in a long time. Residing somewhere between DJ Scud's pummelling gabber style Ambush! material and Timeblind's Three-Foot-Long Bong-Hit of a track "Rastabomba". It's exactly the dancehall cuts that what we here at Aquarius have been thirsting for. Whereas Scud's tracks, being instrumental, were totally insane over-the-top panacea style gabber, "Pressure" is primarily a true dancehall record, with toasting on every track. As such, Martin's rhythms tend to be stripped down more than Scud's. Which isn't to say they ain't hard. Under Wayne Lonesome's damaged toasting for "Fuck Y~Self" for instance is some busy as hell, noisy-assed rhythm that battles 10 rounds with Lonesome's growling. Along with Lonesome, toasters on this record include Daddy Freddy, Roger Robinson, Paul St. Hilaire, The Rootsman and more. A definite must for fans of Ward 21 and sundry other demented dancehall. Absolutely sick, absolutely essential!
